


Wildflowers

by oftachancer



Series: Prompt Fiction [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/F, Flower Babies, M/M, Modern AU, short fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 12:09:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29135331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oftachancer/pseuds/oftachancer
Summary: 14 Days of DA Lovers (2021) Prompt #1. Eshalintarasylnin Lavellan on why some people marry and others do not. [Takes place five years after the action of Nuit de Reve, as yet unpublished as of today, though largely written.]
Relationships: Cassandra Pentaghast/Lyanna Lavellan, Dorian Pavus/Rilienus Maecilia, Eshalintarasylnin Lavellan/Olivier LeBlanc, OC/OC
Series: Prompt Fiction [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2138088
Kudos: 1





	Wildflowers

The house was full of people rushing. Upstairs and downstairs. Inside and out. Flowers needed to be transported from one room to another with alarming speed, apparently. 

Esha sat on the floor with the children. Children in suits and dresses. What was the world coming to? “Everyone’s eaten?”

“Mama says no snacks until after the sermon-y,” one of the twins informed him. Wide blue eyes and dark red hair falling in lazy curls to gather against the frilly collar. Sylvas gasped in a manner befitting an Orlesian horror film as his sister snagged one of the flowers from his basket and ate it. “You can't eat them!”

“Can, too!” Athera was flame-haired and sharp chinned as her mother, sticking her tongue out to reveal the chomped petals. 

“Those are for the fairies,” Tula chirped, her blond hair caught up with flowers in a cheerful crown around her head. 

“They’re for decoration,” Athera crunched.

“They’re for the fairies,” Tula repeated blithely. “My papa said.” She spoke of them so easily: her papa and her father. A year ago, she’d been a hollow-eyed and nervous slip of a thing, but the months Rilienus had taken burrowing into his Orlesian life with her and Dorian had helped the little girl blossom into a confident, cheerful little munchkin. 

He was happy for her. For all of them. He was. Little birds and comfortable nests. And now they were all gathered to sprinkle flower petals for another wedding. 

Weddings and weddings and weddings.

“We’ll have to give flowers to the fairies at your wedding, too,” Tula was saying, coloring the butterfly in her coloring book a striking purple.

Esha blinked twice. “Sorry?”

“When you marry their papa.” 

Esha stared at her. “What gave you that idea?”

“My papa says you marry people when you love them. That’s why he married my _pater_ , and why Aunt Lyanna married Aunt Cassandra, and why Uncle Aran married Uncle Tristan, and why Aunt Tilly is marrying Uncle Anthony, and why-“

“It sounds like the dryads are getting plenty of flowers,” Esha laughed. “I think they’ll be stuffed after today.”

“Do you not love our papa?” Sylvas crossed his arms over the basket to protect it from his sister. 

Esha glanced out the window towards the waiting Chantry. “I do,” he scruffed the boy’s hair. “Very much.”

“So you’ll marry him,” Tula asserted.

“You can love people without marrying them.” Esha pulled a little cloth bag of nuts and dried fruit from his pocket, offering the snack to Athera in lieu of the precious blooms. “Marrying’s just one way of showing you care. Not the only.”

“But it’s how you let everyone  _ know _ that you love them,” Tula said, wrinkling her nose. 

“Look. Marriage- Marriage is like-“ Esha leaned back against the seat of the fancy couch, letting Athera crawl into his lap. “Marriage is like a nice manicured garden. Some people are like roses, eh? They need nice rows and tending and placards that say their names and that’s what keeps them happy and healthy. And some people are like wildflowers. Sometimes wildflowers grow in gardens, but they’re best out in the forests and the plains where they can stretch their roots and muck about.”

“So you and papa are wildflowers?” Sylvas asked, watching him with Olivier’s wise eyes. 

“Your mother’s looking for you.”

Esha glanced up to find Olivier leaning against the doorframe. He was elegant as a silver spoon, metallic embroidery through the dark blue of his suit, casting blossoming petals in patterned relief across his shoulders and down his back. Little wonder he’d been thinking of flora all day. “Off you go to feed the fairies,” he shifted Athera from his lap and retrieved the bag of treats, winking. “Have fun.”

“Wildflowers?” Olivier murmured against his ear as the children ran down the stairs towards the foyer. 

“I love that we’re not getting married today.”

The Orlesian laughed, wrapping an arm around him. “I said that last time.”

“I’m saying it this time.” Esha kissed his cheek. “ _ Ar lath ma, da’sulahn _ .”

“ _ Je t’aime aussi, tempête." _


End file.
